Godsstepbrother
Member
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2017
- Messages
- 53
Hello everyone! I wanted to thank this forum and everything Randy and his crew do for us new hunters. My brother and I (and a friend) are new hunters. We drew 2 cow tags in New Mexico this year. I want to write about our experience in the hopes that other new hunters can take away something meaningful from our hunt.
We have never gone big game hunting, and where nervous. We did our research as much as we could, and saw a lot of videos mostly of Randy and Steve. We showed up a day before the season opened, and glassed for a good 4 hours. To our surprise we found a herd of 20 or so cows. It is amazing how rushed you get just looking at them bedded on a hill! We didn’t sleep much that night, but showed up super early the next morning. Luckily they were a bit closer, and we spotted them by sunrise on opening day of the season. They were at 450 yards from us, I was recording through our glassing scope and luckily so; there were 2 spikes in the herd. My brother took the shot at this range; he missed the first shot re-chambered and nailed it on the second go. I cannot explain how excited we where.
As everyone says packing out was one of the hardest things we have done. We had experience dressing pigs, farm sheep, goats etc… But there is nothing like field dressing a huge cow on a side of the mountain. It is doable and makes everything worthwhile to say the least. We shot her in a bad canyon, and now we know why experience hunters double think taking a shot in a hell hole. We left half of her on a tree over night, and went back to camp. We picked up the rest of her the next morning, and kept hunting.
I do not mean to write a book on this fine forum, we ended up filling both tags. We stalked the herd 2 times over the next 3 days. I know there are a lot of questions I had as a first timer, but some quick points I would give other hunters going on their first hunt are the following.
1. Glass Glass Glass, be patient they are there in front of you most of the time. We learned you do not move your binoculars as much as your eyes in the binocular view. Pick out a tree in view, and without moving your binoculars move your eyes around said tree. After you clear everything around that tree then move your binocular sight and do the same.
2. We really gave them more credit than they deserved. By this I mean, we thought if we can see them they can see us for sure. Many times we got within 200 yards, and they could not hear our whispers or see us. This is even after shooting at the herd, they looked in our general direction but never saw us even when we where on a clearing in an adjacent hill. Don’t be afraid to get within 200 yards. In hindsight we took that long shot because my brother had done it many times on the range, however we were scared we wouldn’t have another chance. (I am sure it is harder to get within 100 yards that is a different story.)
3. Don’t be that hunter that shot his gun the day he bought it, and shoved it in the closet the day after. Practice makes perfect, and you have an ethical duty to make a clean kill. It is the most important part of hunting in my view. My brother is an amazing shot, and I have no desire to shoot because I do not have the time to practice. He practices with his hunting rifle and a 22. He says treat every shot as a high caliber shot, and do not just go plinking. Think about each shot your breath etc… It needs to become muscle memory. I do not want to elaborate as I am not a good shot
4. Layer your cloths, no need for a huge jacket where we went. It was cold, in the mornings it was 30 degrees Fahrenheit without wind-chill, then shot up to the low 60’s mid day. I made the mistake of taking a big jacket with the layers under, and ended up just towing it around. Your hiking most of the time, and there was no need at least were we went.
5. Go out and do it, you’re never going to be ready. As long as you practiced your shot, and zeroed your scope go out and expect to make mistakes. GO DO IT!
I can do another write up on everything we did wrong, but this is already a long post. This is our first hunt and I don’t mean for my experience to be gospel by any means. It is what we experienced, maybe next year we will be proven wrong. Maybe the elk will see us at 300 yards, and I definitely have loads to learn about glassing and hunting in general. This is just the notes we took from our first hunt, and I would love to hear all of your feedback on what we took from it.
You guys rock! And thanks again, this forum and everything about this community is an invaluable resource!
ALSO THE MEAT IS AMAZING!!!
Kill Shot Video
https://youtu.be/9eoBmNahzRo
We have never gone big game hunting, and where nervous. We did our research as much as we could, and saw a lot of videos mostly of Randy and Steve. We showed up a day before the season opened, and glassed for a good 4 hours. To our surprise we found a herd of 20 or so cows. It is amazing how rushed you get just looking at them bedded on a hill! We didn’t sleep much that night, but showed up super early the next morning. Luckily they were a bit closer, and we spotted them by sunrise on opening day of the season. They were at 450 yards from us, I was recording through our glassing scope and luckily so; there were 2 spikes in the herd. My brother took the shot at this range; he missed the first shot re-chambered and nailed it on the second go. I cannot explain how excited we where.
As everyone says packing out was one of the hardest things we have done. We had experience dressing pigs, farm sheep, goats etc… But there is nothing like field dressing a huge cow on a side of the mountain. It is doable and makes everything worthwhile to say the least. We shot her in a bad canyon, and now we know why experience hunters double think taking a shot in a hell hole. We left half of her on a tree over night, and went back to camp. We picked up the rest of her the next morning, and kept hunting.
I do not mean to write a book on this fine forum, we ended up filling both tags. We stalked the herd 2 times over the next 3 days. I know there are a lot of questions I had as a first timer, but some quick points I would give other hunters going on their first hunt are the following.
1. Glass Glass Glass, be patient they are there in front of you most of the time. We learned you do not move your binoculars as much as your eyes in the binocular view. Pick out a tree in view, and without moving your binoculars move your eyes around said tree. After you clear everything around that tree then move your binocular sight and do the same.
2. We really gave them more credit than they deserved. By this I mean, we thought if we can see them they can see us for sure. Many times we got within 200 yards, and they could not hear our whispers or see us. This is even after shooting at the herd, they looked in our general direction but never saw us even when we where on a clearing in an adjacent hill. Don’t be afraid to get within 200 yards. In hindsight we took that long shot because my brother had done it many times on the range, however we were scared we wouldn’t have another chance. (I am sure it is harder to get within 100 yards that is a different story.)
3. Don’t be that hunter that shot his gun the day he bought it, and shoved it in the closet the day after. Practice makes perfect, and you have an ethical duty to make a clean kill. It is the most important part of hunting in my view. My brother is an amazing shot, and I have no desire to shoot because I do not have the time to practice. He practices with his hunting rifle and a 22. He says treat every shot as a high caliber shot, and do not just go plinking. Think about each shot your breath etc… It needs to become muscle memory. I do not want to elaborate as I am not a good shot
4. Layer your cloths, no need for a huge jacket where we went. It was cold, in the mornings it was 30 degrees Fahrenheit without wind-chill, then shot up to the low 60’s mid day. I made the mistake of taking a big jacket with the layers under, and ended up just towing it around. Your hiking most of the time, and there was no need at least were we went.
5. Go out and do it, you’re never going to be ready. As long as you practiced your shot, and zeroed your scope go out and expect to make mistakes. GO DO IT!
I can do another write up on everything we did wrong, but this is already a long post. This is our first hunt and I don’t mean for my experience to be gospel by any means. It is what we experienced, maybe next year we will be proven wrong. Maybe the elk will see us at 300 yards, and I definitely have loads to learn about glassing and hunting in general. This is just the notes we took from our first hunt, and I would love to hear all of your feedback on what we took from it.
You guys rock! And thanks again, this forum and everything about this community is an invaluable resource!
ALSO THE MEAT IS AMAZING!!!
Kill Shot Video
https://youtu.be/9eoBmNahzRo
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